Life Recovery Steps 5-8Life Recovery Steps 5-8
Life Recovery Today with Stephen Arterburn
Steve Arterburn and Dr. Dave Stoop talk through Life Recovery Steps 5–8, linking confession, humility, and making amends with biblical teaching. The conversation outlines how honesty, readiness, and willingness to repair harm can support healing, character growth, and spiritual connection.
28:32•11 May 2026
Life Recovery Steps 5–8: Confession, Humility and Making Things Right
Episode Overview
- Healing is linked to confessing sins to God, to oneself, and to another person, breaking denial and isolation.
- Step 6 focuses on becoming entirely ready for God to work, by developing humility and letting go of self‑centred attitudes.
- Step 7 moves from attitude to action, humbly asking God to remove long‑standing shortcomings, even when that involves emotional pain.
- Step 8 requires making a specific list of people harmed and viewing amends from the other person’s perspective: what would you want done for you?
- Working these steps rebuilds character lost to addiction, replacing lies and deceit with responsibility, honesty, and restored relationships.
“Our healing comes as we are able to confess our sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”
How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety? This conversation from *Life Recovery Today with Stephen Arterburn* zooms in on Steps 5–8 of Life Recovery, showing how confession, humility, willingness, and making amends can open the door to healing. Hosted by Becky Brown, the programme features Steve Arterburn and the late Dr. Dave Stoop, whose calm, practical wisdom keeps things honest and very human.
They talk through Step 5 as “a lost art in Christianity today” – admitting “the exact nature” of your wrongs to God, yourself, and another person. You’ll hear why James 5:16 is so central: “confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed,” and how real change starts when you stop trying to fix everything on your own. Step 6 is all about readiness and attitude.
Steve and Dave stress that being “entirely ready” isn’t a quick prayer and move on; it’s a slow, humbling shift away from ego and self‑centredness, trusting that “the further down we go in our humility, the more God is going to lift us up.” From there, Step 7 moves from attitude to action: humbly asking God to remove shortcomings, recognising that long‑standing patterns don’t change with a snap of the fingers and that there may be pain before freedom.
Step 8 gets very practical: making a specific list of those you’ve harmed and becoming willing to make amends, guided by the question, “What would I want done for me?” Stories of paying back old debts – even decades later and with interest – show how costly honesty can lead to real freedom and restored character.
Whether someone is dealing with addiction, broken relationships, or just a backlog of regret, this episode points toward a simple question: are you willing to be honest, humble, and connected enough to let God and others help you change?
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